Chapter 14
CHAPTER 14
ARLAND
T hanksgiving was always a tough time for me. My father was missing and the holidays only seemed to highlight that. None of us ever took his seat at the head of the table, my mother in her seat on the left of what used to be his place and me on his right.
Next to me was my little sister, Lillian, and her husband, Charlie. My brother Grant sat on Charlie’s other side, next to his wife, Natasha. Smith and my ex-wife were next to mom across from us, while my gaggle of nieces and nephews were at a smaller table beside ours.
Thankfully, they never paid attention to what we were doing, their own hoots of laughter and childlike conversation filling the air. A good thing, since to this day, Lillian spent a great deal of our time at dinner glaring at Lisa and Smith, still not over what they’d done to me. She was my favorite by far.
While I loved seeing my siblings and their families, and spending time with Mom, there were always some tense and uncomfortable moments with Smith next to Lisa, and I was about to have to step in to diffuse one of them.
Lillian never backed down from a fight, and she thoroughly enjoyed picking them with Lisa—as she was doing right then. “So you and Smith went to Fiji? Why? That’s where you went on your honeymoon with my brother, wasn’t it?”
“I’m your brother too,” Smith snapped, sliding his arm around Lisa’s shoulders and leveling a glare at our sister. “Yes, Lil, we went to Fiji, and also yes. That is where they went on their honeymoon. Does it matter? It’s a whole country. One to which, incidentally, I had never been and have always wanted to go. Am I supposed to avoid an entire country now just because they went there together once?”
“Well, no. You were supposed to avoid wrecking a marriage twenty-five years ago,” she said. “Going to the place where they went on their honeymoon is simply rubbing salt in the wounds.”
Mom pursed her lips and took a big swig of wine as she watched the drama unfold. I noticed she didn’t lift a finger to stop it, but she never did. She hadn’t been a fan of Lisa’s, not even before all the stuff with Smith had gone down, and I got the feeling she rather enjoyed my sister calling her out on all the things they still did to rub it in my face.
Like going to Fiji.
Personally, I loved traveling and the island nation had been on my personal bucket list for a couple years before I’d decided to take her there on our honeymoon. A week during which I’d gone sightseeing more often than I’d seen the sight of her, and Lisa had chosen to spend most of her time working on her tan.
I didn’t particularly feel like the island had become sacred or even special to either of us due to it having been the destination of our honeymoon, but there was a great big world out there. Many other islands and countries with beautiful stretches of beach that Smith hadn’t been to either, yet he’d chosen to go there.
It was possible he’d chosen it to somehow overshadow the memories she had of going there with me, but either way, I didn’t really care. Smith was closest to me in age, only eleven months younger, and as a result, it sometimes felt like he’d turned our entire existence into some kind of pissing contest.
Something I didn’t have time for.
I leaned forward, glancing at my sister and waiting for her deep, dark eyes—Dad’s eyes—to meet mine. “Lillian, let it go. Let’s just enjoy our meal, alright?”
“Let’s,” Lisa agreed snidely, smirking as she melted into my brother’s side.
He still looked annoyed, running his hand through hair that he dyed to keep it our natural almost black color rather than letting it go gray. Rolling his eyes at our sister, he finally grabbed his wine glass and gulped it down. Lillian looked ready to stab him.
An awkward silence fell across the table until Grant, our youngest brother, finally broke it. He was nearly seven years younger than me and he’d always been the comic relief of our family.
“Did Tash tell you guys what Georgie did in his class the other day?” he asked, eyes crinkling at the corners as he glanced over his shoulder at his three-year-old son.
When he turned back to us and saw everyone shaking their heads, he lowered his voice. “He recently got to that phase where his hand is always in his pants. It’s a developmental thing, you know? But the teachers always try to discourage it so the kids learn to leave it alone.”
Mom glanced at Smith, Grant, and me in turn. “Oh, I’m familiar with that phase of development. All three of you were fascinated when you first discovered that particular appendage.”
I laughed, but Smith pursed his lips in annoyance while Grant chuckled before he continued his story. “So the teacher asked Georgie if he had ants in his pants, or why his hand was always in there. He looks at her, totally serious, and says, ‘It’s not ants. It’s my penis.’”
I roared with laughter and so did everyone other than Lisa and Smith, who looked down their noses like Grant was the most distasteful person they’d ever encountered. Boy, did I dodge a bullet with that one.
Grant’s anecdote had successfully diffused the tension around the table though, and from there, we managed to have a delicious meal with pleasant conversation. Lisa stayed out of most of it, which helped, since keeping quiet meant she wasn’t giving Lillian any fresh ammunition.
After dinner, there was a bit of a lull where we were all nursing our drinks and moving as little as possible, until Kevin, Lillian’s eldest, came hurtling back into the dining room carrying a football. At seven, the boy seemed to be an endless well of energy, and while I was halfway into a food coma, I already knew I would give in to his request.
“Can we play now?” he asked, sending a pleading look around the table. “We’ve been waiting all day! You kept saying after dinner, and it’s after dinner now. Pleeaase?”
“Of course, little man.” I pushed my chair back and Mom shot me a little smile. Then she drained her glass and stood up herself.
“I’ll be the water girl,” she said happily. “Someone has to make sure you keep hydrated.”
I chuckled, not inclined to disagree. “Add some scotch to my water, and I’ll be forever grateful.”
She winked. “I’ll take care of you, darling.”
One by one, my siblings and their spouses stood up as well, and we went into Mom’s massive front yard for a game of football with the kids. It had been a snowy, soggy Thanksgiving day and the air outside was frosty. A light breeze sliced right through the exposed parts of our bodies when we stepped outside.
I shivered, rubbing my hands together before I jogged down the stairs, shaking my arms out at my sides and trying to keep moving to warm up. All around me, the other adults were doing the same while the kids seemed impervious to the cold.
Lillian had grabbed a woolen hat on our way out of the house, and her raven curls stuck out from underneath it. Her eyes blazed as she watched Lisa and Smith bundle up just inside the front doors. She sniffed, her head shaking. “They’re so gross.”
I reached out and ruffled her hair, nearly knocking the hat off in the process. “Deep breaths, Lil. It’s all good.”
“How is it all good?” She scoffed. “He fucked your wife, Arland, and then he married her. To make matters worse, he’s been insisting on bringing her to all our family events for twenty years. It’s a slap in your face every time and I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I, but their kids are still your kids’ cousins. You need to try to?—”
“Don’t you dare tell me I should forgive them,” she fumed. “Besides, those kids should’ve been your kids. I don’t want my children around Smith and Lisa. What kind of example do they set?”
I groaned. “Maybe Lisa and I would’ve had kids, but maybe not. Those are Smith’s children, Lil. You’re their aunt.”
“Yes, but I’d rather be an aunt to yours ,” she said firmly. “He’s always been a horrible brother anyway and you wanted a family with her, though I can’t even begin to fathom why.”
Immediate tension zapped across the grounds when they stepped out of the house, and I sighed. “I was young and stupid. She was pretty, and after marriage, kids seemed like the next step.”
The truth was that I really had wanted a big family. Once upon a time, Lisa had murmured all sorts of sweet nothings in my ear about how she’d let me fill her with my children one after the other. At the time, that had been as good a reason for me to put a ring on it as any.
My family was one of the most prominent in the area. We were the highest rung of the elite, and while Lisa’s family wasn’t near ours in terms of status, they were relatively highly regarded themselves. It had seemed like a decent match, and when she’d promised all those kids, well, I’d taken the leap.
After what happened with her though, I’d decided having a family probably wasn’t for me. My dreams of settling down and hearing the pitter-patter of little feet throughout my house had died right along with my marriage, and that had been that.
“Are we doing this or what?” Smith called from the other side of the yard, holding out a hand for Kevin to pass him the ball.
The little boy glanced at him, frowned, and raised the ball himself, passing it smoothly to Grant’s oldest, Kiara, who was only two days younger than him. They were our dynamic duo, and we had a blast once the game got underway.
I was proud to say that I was the favorite uncle, and playing football with them on Thanksgiving was a blessing I would never take for granted. Even if I would never have kids of my own to do this with.
Smith came racing over to me a little while later, intercepting the ball as I passed it to Natasha. I didn’t hesitate, lowering my shoulders and smacking into him as hard as I could, tackling him to the ground with a dull thud.
Damn, it sure feels good to knock him on his butt. He grunted, glaring up at me.
Lillian jogged up to give me a high-five. “Well done, bro.”
I chuckled, turning away without offering to help him up and instead striding to the side of the yard with her for a team huddle. I smiled as I bumped my hip into hers, wondering if I should let her in on my secret.
After my talk with Mom, I’d seriously started considering keeping a little less distance from Mariam once she got back, and from the looks of things, my sister desperately needed that kind of cheering up. “If everything works out the way I’m hoping it will, I might have a new lady coming around at Christmas. It really is all good, sis. I promise.”
The anger left her face and pleasant surprise replaced it, but before she could ask any questions, I called the kids closer and bent over to discuss strategy with their eager faces. I knew Lillian would want to know everything, but at this point, there really wasn’t much to tell.
Soon though, I was hoping that would change. Real, real soon. Like as soon as I found myself looking right into those gorgeous blue eyes of Mariam’s again.